Dhaka – BNP senior leader Lt Gen (retd) Mahbubur Rahman on Friday said the Prime Minister’s instruction to the Election Commission (EC) to check irregularities and faults in the remaining phases of Union Parishad polls has manifested the Commission’s weakness and incompetence, UNB news agency reported.
“The Prime Minister has asked the Election Commission to hold a fair and good election. But, it is not supposed to be. Instead, the Commission should have directed the PM and the government to take measures as per its instructions,” he said. Addressing a discussion, the BNP leader further said, “The Prime Minister’s instruction to the Commission has proved its weakness, failures and incapability.”
Jatiyatabadi Sangskritik Dal arranged the programme at the Jatiya Press Club.
Earlier on Thursday, an Awami League delegation, led by its joint general secretary Mahbubul Alam Hanif, met Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Kazi Rakibuddin Ahmad at the latter’s EC Secretariat office and conveyed the message of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to him.
“There’s a strong instruction from the Prime Minister. She doesn’t want to see any irregularity, fault and deviation in the elections. We’ve conveyed the PM’s instruction to the EC,” Hanif told reporters while emerging from the EC secretariat after the meeting.
Mahbub, a BNP standing committee member, said the country’s election system has got spoiled as the EC has miserably failed to perform its constitutional duty.
He alleged that the opposition leaders and activists have been forced to abandon their houses due to hooliganism by the ruling party men in the election areas.
The BNP leader said though the ruling party men continued repressing and intimidating the BNP candidates and their supporters, the EC is playing a silent role. “Instead, they’re working in favour of the ruling party.”
“A holy festival is being celebrated with bloodletting in the name of election, and many people are getting killed. So, this election can’t be accepted,” he observed.
Mahbub said no fair election is possible unless the non-party caretaker government is restored.
He also said they together with people will realise their demand for holding the national election under a non-party administration.
